This copy is for your personal non-commercial use only. To order presentation-ready copies of Toronto Star content for distribution to colleagues, clients or customers, or inquire about permissions/licensing, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com

Chris Xuereb, the Toronto trainer at the heart of a doping scandal involving two of Jamaica’s top sprinters, was fired from a Toronto sports medicine clinic owned by Dr. Anthony Galea, according to the doctor’s lawyer.

Galea pleaded guilty in 2011 to importing misbranded drugs into the U.S.

Xuereb, who is now the subject of a criminal investigation in Italy along with sprinters Asafa Powell and Sherone Simpson, was a physiotherapist’s assistant who began exceeding the boundaries of his job detail, according to Brian Greenspan, Galea’s lawyer.

“He (was fired) because he was exceeding his authority, talking to patients and making treatment recommendations he wasn’t qualified to do,” Greenspan said.

Greenspan said Xuereb was dismissed in July 2010 following advice from Galea’s colleagues at the Institute of Sports Medicine and Wellness Centre in Toronto. Xuereb was advised to obtain certification in his field, but came back empty-handed after leaving to study massage therapy.

Article Continued Below

Repeated emails and phone calls to Xuereb were not returned.

But late Tuesday night, Xuereb emailed a lengthy statement refuting all claims he was responsible for the positive tests. Here are some of the highlights:

<bullet>I did not provide any banned or illegal substances to Asafa Powell or Sherone Simpson.

While I did recommend vitamins … I was instructed by the agent and athletes to buy these vitamins. All vitamins recommended by me were shown to the MVP club coach Stephen Francis. He has gone on record and confirmed the vitamins recommended by me did not contain any performance enhancing substance and were not what was found in Asafa and Sherone’s positive drug testing findings.

<bullet>All vitamins provided by me were found to be legal by the Italian Police. … It is obvious that these athletes were taking additional supplements that were not discussed or known to me. I was informed by the Italian police that other supplements were found in these athletes’ possession.

<bullet>I cooperated fully with the Italian police and provided answers to all their questions. I was not arrested or detained as alleged. I was simply questioned for several hours (as were Asafa and Sherone) and free to leave.

<bullet>Both athletes are clearly looking for a scapegoat. … I have done nothing wrong. We need to remember that in addition to Asafa and Sherone, three other Jamaican athletes tested positive at the 2013 Jamaican trials. I had no contact with these athletes.

<bullet>It is time the athletes took responsibility for their doping instead of looking around for a scapegoat whether that person is their therapist, bartender or anyone else.

<bullet>Athletes keep using the same story which is to blame the scapegoat for their own wrongdoing. I am extremely disappointed that these athletes have chosen to blame me for their own violations. WADA and the public needs to stop accepting these stories and hold these athletes accountable. End of email.

Italian police raided hotel rooms over the weekend listed to Xuereb and the sprinters in the town of Lignano Sabbiadoro, about 100 kilometres east of Venice, confiscating substances that are potentially in violation of Italy’s doping laws.

Jamaican sprinters train during the summer in Lignano, and the sprinter’s agent, Paul Doyle, said Xuereb was recently hired on as their new trainer.

Xuereb has since removed his Facebook and LinkedIn accounts, but on Monday, listed himself as a trainer to elite athletes in Canada, the U.S., and the Caribbean, with accomplishments including gold and silver medals at the 2012 London Olympics.

Greenspan said Xuereb never worked with Galea, and Greenspan said his client later expressed his concern to Athletics Canada when he became aware that Xuereb’s resume contained false information about his relationship with the clinic and Galea.

Xuereb later requested entry as a therapist to a track meet at the U of T’s Varsity Centre where Olympic and 100m world record-holder Usain Bolt was competing, but was turned away after officials reviewed his credentials.

Galea once administered a single treatment of platelet-rich plasma therapy to Powell for a hamstring problem, Greenspan said.

“He (Xuereb) never worked with Dr. Galea on anything,” Greenspan said, whose client’s patients included Tiger Woods and Donovan Bailey.

Doyle said on Tuesday that Xuereb became increasingly suspicious to the sprinters because they suspected he was administering substances containing outlawed stimulants.

“Asafa and Sherone have been tested more than 100 times each through their career ... and never turned in a positive test,” Doyle told The Associated Press on Tuesday. “Now they change their supplements and the first time they get tested, they have a positive test? It has to be something in those new supplements that has caused it. Chris is the one that provided those.

“We’re not trying to throw Chris under the bus and blame him for anything. We know it has to be something in the supplements he gave them. We’re not saying he did anything deliberate, but it’s in those supplements. We need to figure out what it was that caused this and from there move forward.”

About a month before the raid — which was executed following a tip from the World Anti-Doping Agency — the two sprinters tested positive for oxilofrine, which is part of the synephrine family of decongestants, some of which have been banned by WADA.

But while Xuereb is being questioned by the agent for providing the athletes with allegedly banned stimulants, there is no excuse for both Powell and Simpson to not be fully aware of WADA’s banned substance lists, according to a U of T professor with expertise in blood doping.

“We definitely tell all our Canadian athletes to not take supplements unless they are certified for sport,” said Dr. Doug Richards, the Medical Director of the U of T’s MacIntosh Sport Medicine Clinic.

Richards was referring to the National Standards Federation, which reviews supplements to ensure they do not contain stimulants or steroids not listed on the labels. Richards said there are 390 or more supplements the NSF has certified for sport.

“In this situation, with (the NSF lists) they either did it deliberately, or they were careless, but either way, it’s (Powell and Simpson) who are responsible, not the Canadian trainer,” Richards added.

Doyle also suggested Xuereb acted beyond the normal protocol of cross-referencing all substances his athletes are given.

“In hindsight, we should’ve been given a list, made sure we got a list,” Doyle said. “The extent of what I did, I said to (Xuereb) in a text message, that all supplements have to be cleared by me first. He never cleared them with me. He did send them in an invoice that had the names of supplements in there that he had purchased. But that was it. I didn’t have the ingredient list.”

Richards said supplements can contain substances that do not appear on the ingredient list on the bottle or package.

Delivered dailyThe Morning Headlines Newsletter

The Toronto Star and thestar.com, each property of Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, One Yonge Street, 4th Floor, Toronto, ON, M5E 1E6. You can unsubscribe at any time. Please contact us or see our privacy policy for more information.

More from the Toronto Star & Partners

LOADING

Copyright owned or licensed by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or distribution of this content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Toronto Star Newspapers Limited and/or its licensors. To order copies of Toronto Star articles, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com